


Cry, Little Sister

by Charmtion



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Angst and Tragedy, F/M, House Stark, Little Wolf., R Plus L Equals J, Sexual Content, Sibling Incest, Starkcest, Wolves of the North.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-29
Updated: 2019-09-28
Packaged: 2019-09-30 04:00:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,368
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17216615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Charmtion/pseuds/Charmtion
Summary: A crown, a garland, a laurel – awreath. That is what those roses were, laid so sweetly upon the lap of a daughter of the north. Blood and fire: they were that, too. Death, dust, danger –war.Long before the she-wolf met the dragon, she loved another.





	1. Three

What made his sister?

He often wondered it. Be he sat at supper by the lord’s high-backed chair, or ringing sword-song in the yard, or hunting through the wolfswood. He often watched her as he wondered it: within the high-raftered hall of Winterfell, upon the snow-swept cobblestones, beneath the swell of soldier pines. This evenfall was much the same. He sat and watched and wondered.

Lyanna Stark was three: wolf, wild, and warrior. The sum of each was what made her. But she was more than three, in truth. She was all, she was everything. The blood in her veins swayed as the silver-grey rivers splitting forest and farmstead. The breath that smoked from her mouth was the warmth of half a thousand hearths spread like stars the leagues of land their father ruled. She was the north: she was the hills, the valleys, the lakes of ice, the woods, the groves. She was winter – wild as the wolves who raged as warriors against its white winds.

More than that – she was _his_.

Brandon Stark was three as well: wolf, wild, and warrior. The sum of each was what made him. But he was more than three, in truth. He was earth and fire and ice and water – all and everything. The blood in his veins burned the ferocity of half a thousand storms of snow and hail. The breath that smoked from his mouth was the flames that lit the grey-tipped arrows of archers in the long night. He was the north: he was the land, the hard-faced men who moved upon it, the shadowcats in the mountains, the bears who roared with the sound of giants, the blue-grey eagles who soared on wings of air. He was winter – wild as the wolves who raged as warriors against its white winds.

More than that – he was _hers_.

He knew it as well as he knew most anything: the weight of sword in his hand, the crunch of snow underfoot, the sting of ice come morning, the bite of breath come night – the beat of his own heart. He knew her as well as he knew most anything: the twists and turrets of grey stone castle, the scent of soldier pines in the wolfswood, the steps of sword-song, the feel of a warhorse between his thighs – the beat of his own heart.

What made his sister?

 _He_ made her – just as _she_ made him.

Made him what?

 _She_ made him wild as the wolves who raged as warriors against winter’s white winds. With her thumbs and tongue and teeth, she turned him liquid as the silver-grey rivers that wove her veins. As a wolf, she pinned him: lips curled in snarls and growls. As a wolf, he snapped right back.

He did not blush to think this of her as he sat beside their father within the high-raftered hall of Winterfell. He did not blush to think this of her as she sat in a gown of soft grey wool beside their quiet storm-eyed brother. He did not blush to think this of them both as they sat in the fire-glow of family. Here, they were but men: sitting, eating, drinking, grinning, living, dying. Together, there were wolves – and wolves do not blush, wolves do not feel shame at following the rhythms that beat their blood from heart to lung to wrist to throat. Wolves do what wolves _do_ : move lithe as shadows, stalk and step and sing and shout – till hunger draws them out from the wood.

As one they were three: wolf, wild, and warrior.

And _always_ hungry…

* * *


	2. Godswood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The wolf-wild wake of Brandon Stark's betrothal to Catelyn Tully.

Later, their quiet storm-eyed brother would find his peace beneath the white-fingered weirwood tree at the heart of the godswood. But here _now_ , his siblings found the opposite amongst its crooked roots – as they had always done. There was no peace to be had in the coupling of wolves: only tooth and claw and scratch and bite. Peace came at the end when both were spent and stumbling – when seed and sweat bled together to darken the soil between the crooked roots of the white-fingered weirwood tree.

They were ever wolves when they were together: growling, snapping, snarling – but this evenfall it was different. She ran from him when he followed her into the shadows of ironwood, oak, elm, and alder; her soft grey gown a billow of snow-swept storm flaring as a wraith behind her. Swift and sure, she cut a path well-trod to the heart of the godswood. He followed her, lithe and mean and hungry as a wolf, showing his white teeth in a snarl. She span to face him, the weirwood tree at her back, and she stopped him with a look that stung him cold as winter’s white winds.

“Lya…” he began, but his voice died in his throat.

Deep in the shadows of this forest of gods and men, she glowed moon-white as clasp and cloak dropped to her feet. Naked as her nameday, she stood amongst the crooked roots of the white-fingered weirwood tree. She was three here, too: wolf, wild, and warrior. Hair a black twist of braids and wildflowers, cheek soft velvet made ivory by moon-glow, breasts rising with quick breath, dusky nipples ice-hard – hard as her eyes shining wolf-wild on his as she drew him, _hungry_ , from the trees.

“Have a care, take a look, brother,” she said, her voice a crack of ice in this world of echoes. “It will be the last time you see a wolf – your life will be a three-forked river and the blue-eyed trout that swims it.” Her thumb trailed the peak of a moon-white breast; his mouth watered with animal lust. “Is that what you want, Brandon Stark?”

He was on her before she could breathe. Trapped by the hot hard body of a wild wolf to the white-fingered weirwood tree, she gripped his cheek and tore through his black beard to slash his flesh with her nails. His warrior’s hand – sword-rough and sword-strong – gripped her neck, tipped back her head till her throat stretched white and smooth beneath his teeth. She growled low in her belly, warned him off marking it. He trailed his tongue the line of her jaw. She moaned and rolled and bit her lip: her throat a trembling moon-white valley inviting his lips. A capitulation, a sacrifice – an offering. He marked it with his teeth and she mewled.

“Cry, little sister,” he said, his lips sucking the sting from the bite on her neck. “That is what you want to do, isn’t it?”

“I’ll cry,” she said, spearing his cheek with her nails as she smiled at him. “I’ll cry tears of joy to think of you fucking that cold fish in your marital bed.” Her voice was a whisper now. “You’ll cry, too, brother – sad raindrops that’ll stain your lady wife as you fuck her thinking of another.” Her fingers travelled the broad span of his chest, swept the hard plain of his belly, pulled at straining laces. “That is what you’ll do, isn’t it?”

He took her mouth before she could say another word. A clash of teeth and tongue and taste: he drank her hungrily. His fingers found her nipple as her fingers found his cock – both ice-hard and aching. She wanted to moan; he saw the sound of it shape her plush mouth. But she snarled at him instead, her teeth white as the moonlight filtering the godswood. He bit her lip – she bit back. They were wolves again as their taunts faded to smoke on the icy air. Wolves: tooth and claw and scratch and bite. Her thighs, a swell of silver, parted to loop his hips. His warrior’s hands – sword-rough and sword-strong – gripped the soft flesh of her waist, his fingers slotting the arrows of her ribs. He held her hard enough to bruise; she rolled her head to gaze down at him and there it was rising sweet as wolfsong from her lips: a full, rich moan.

“Hold a fish that tight and you’ll kill it,” she whispered, but the malice was faded with her sharp words as smoke to the icy air. His fingers parted her where she was hottest; she bit his lip and clouded his mouth with her whimper as he rolled her in his palm. “Now _this_ is what you want, isn’t it?”

“Cry, little sister,” he growled as he slid his cock inside her. “I want to hear you cry out for me.” She took him wholly – as she always did. “ _That_ is what I want, Lyanna Stark.”

She was fire in a world of ice. She _burned_ him, not just there where she was hottest, but here between the crooks of his ribs: swept like hot blood to fill his belly with flame and blaze his heart.

He groaned, he growled – she moaned, she snarled.

If any ear passed this world of gods and men and chanced to catch sound of what moved and snapped and writhed beneath the shadows of the moon, they would hear only wolfsong. For that was what they were: wolves. In their eyes and teeth and claws: wolves. In the wild thrust of hips, the keening growl of throats, the glimmer of white teeth sinking soft flesh: _wolves_.

He marked her with his mouth as she marked him with her cunt: hot and wet, they left bite and print on each other’s skin. She moved around him wild as a storm, her fingers dagger-points ripping the plump muscles of his shoulders. He slammed into her with the strength of giants, turned her back to blood where it rubbed against the white-fingered weirwood tree. There was no peace to be had in the coupling of wolves: only tooth and claw and scratch and bite.

And yet afterward – _afterward_ …

Afterward, when they were spent and stumbling, there was peace. _Peace_ – now that seed and sweat bled together to darken the soil between the crooked roots of the white-fingered weirwood tree. They lay there together, curled amongst the red-gold leaves where later their quiet storm-eyed brother would find a fraction of the same peace his siblings sought in this forest of gods and men.

She whimpered in his arms; he pressed kisses to her brow, smoothed sword-strong fingers through the dark gloss of her hair, whispered thumbprint over the ragged scratches on her back. Above them, the white-fingered weirwood tree showed the mark of them: a bruise of her blood rubbed red-raw onto its bone-white bark. She lifted her face from his chest and took his kiss as it landed: gentle now, no bite or snarl.

“You’ll marry Catelyn Tully,” whispered Lyanna Stark, staring at eyes the same winter-grey as her own. “But you’ll always be _mine_.”

“Yours, Lya,” murmured Brandon Stark, closing his eyes as her kiss ghosted the corner of his mouth. “As you are _mine_.”

* * *


	3. Crown

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The aftermath of a wreath of winter roses given at a tourney.

Winter roses, ice-blue, ice-cold, laid upon the lap of a daughter of the north. Could a crown of flowers change the world so? By look of the crowd, the world was already changed. The singers would say smiles died and storm-clouds blew in; but in truth it was not so sudden.

The change blew in soft and slow as winter’s white winds, turning tourney sand to dust and bone, setting frost over the fire that ruled this land of always summer. Murmurs dropped to nothing; laughter faded as music ebbs and drifts and flows, dying its last shifting notes from the silver-stringed harp it rose from. Just as winter’s white winds blow in soft and slow, the heat of the day eddied out: air turned frosty as the ice-blue roses laid upon the lap of a daughter of the north.

 _Queen_ … the word rang out, slow and sweet as soft-fallen snow.

 _Love_ … the second tarried with the first, warm as honey.

 _Beauty_ … the third raced to eat the air where the others still swayed, sharp as the thorns amongst the ice-blue roses.

A crown, a garland, a laurel – a _wreath_. That is what those roses were, laid so sweetly upon the lap of a daughter of the north. Blood and fire: they were that, too. Death, dust, danger – _war_. They were one and three, four and five. They were everything: they were all. Later, that crown of frost would haunt the dreams of the living – would turn their quiet storm-eyed brother mad with grief and guilt at promises taken and oaths kept. But here, _now_ , his siblings watched silent as the rest the silver-haired prince turn the land of always summer to dust and bone and frost.

The dragon prince rode out on a palfrey the same spun silver as his hair; but he left wolves behind in his wake. Wolf-wild eyes, each the same winter-grey as the other, lifted to meet over the swell of silent crowd and ash-strewn tourney stand.

Even here, in the land of always summer, they were three: wolf, wild, and warrior.

And _always_ hungry…

ფ

Hunger saw them miss the feast thrown in that great black castle skulking as a shadow upon its high hill. Hunger saw them slip as wraiths toward the fire-glow of a tent strewn in grey-and-white. Hunger saw them turn as wolves to face each other: wild-eyed with lips threatening always to smile – or to snap.

“Did you see them stare, brother?” asked Lyanna, the fireflame dancing in her eyes. “Did you see them look to me as he laid those roses in my lap?” Lip caught between her sharp white teeth, she smiled. “Did you see him mark me _his_ before all the world?”

She was on her back in a moment, trapped to a bed of bearskins by the hot hard body of a wild wolf. He kissed her: a rough kiss more teeth than tongue. He tasted the rust of blood, pulled back to wipe the bloom of it from her trembling lip. She tilted her head and whimpered, surging up from the bearskins to get at his mouth again. The frost melted from his heart: he was warm now.

“You are not his, little sister,” said Brandon, nipping her jaw between sharp white teeth. “You are _mine_.”

His words spun hard on her skin as his teeth. Quick and sharp, he sank marks the entire stretch of her: every valley and rib and rise, every soft swell and trembling peak. Her moon-white skin was a blush of bruise and bite; and she moaned and spread her thighs. Where the crown of frost had turned her lap to ice, his mouth now worked back the flame. Between her legs, where she was hottest – the silk of her thighs beneath his warrior’s hands. Sword-rough, sword-strong, his fingers gripped the swell of her skin; his tongue lapped the smoke of her scent. Soft and slow as winter’s white winds blow in, her body set to heat and spice beneath the wild wolf that supped between her thighs.

“Cry, little sister,” he growled against her, parting silk and slick hot folds with tongue and fingers. “I want to hear you cry out for me.” Her thighs trembled as a doe trapped by a wolf. “Cry for me, because you are _mine_.”

But she was no doe – she was what he was: a wolf.

Her fingers twisted into the black hair streaming his brow. Strong as a giant, she wrenched him from her cunt, pulled him flush against her. He was on his back before he could growl or grunt – and there she sat, the silk of her thighs spread over his hot hard belly as her fingers circled his cock. His hands held her hips as she sank down onto him; she threw her head back, skyward, winter-grey eyes shut tight against the world of gods and men that swept as stars overhead.

He did not blush to watch her surge as the sea upon him. He did not blush to see her run her fingers over her breasts as she rocked her hips and rippled red-hot around his cock. He did not blush to groan as she took his thumb and dented it with her sharp white teeth. Here, they were away from men: sitting, eating, drinking, grinning, living, dying in that hulking black castle on its high hill. Here, _together_ they were wolves – and wolves do not blush, wolves do not feel shame at following the rhythms that beat their blood from heart to lung to wrist to throat. Wolves do what wolves _do_ : here, _now_ , that was to fuck with the sudden storm-swept ferocity of winter’s white winds.

“I’ll cry,” she said, her voice a breathy moan. “I’ll cry tears of joy to think of you as a dragon turns my skin to flame.” Sorrow tarried with the sweet smile on her lips. “You’ll cry, too, brother – wild raindrops that’ll stain your blue-eyed trout as you fuck her thinking of another.” She leaned low over his chest to press a kiss to the corner of his mouth. “That is what will happen, isn’t it? Wolves that run together will soon run apart.”

He snared her lip with his teeth; bit hard to taste the bloom of blood. He turned her beneath him, fingers bone-crushingly gripped, splitting her thighs as he moved hard, fast, wolf-wild – pushing, pulling, thrusting, _bruising_.

“Never,” he growled, breathing hard as they fought and fucked. “He’ll _never_ have you, little sister.” She moaned with every thrust; he kissed her with a dark smile twisting his lips. “ _Mine_ , Lya… as I am _yours_.”

ფ

Brandon Stark was four the morrow after the tourney: wolf, wild, warrior, and _wrong_.

The dragon prince rode out on a palfrey the same spun silver as his hair – and a daughter of the north rode beside him, a wreath of frost upon the dark gloss of her hair.

Could a crown of flowers change the world so? By look of the wild wolf waking ragged in his bed of bearskins, the world was already changed. The singers would say smiles died and storm-clouds blew in; but in truth it was not so sudden.

The change blew in soft and slow as winter’s white winds, turning fire-lit tent to dust and bone, setting frost over the heat that ruled the air where wolves were once made to one. Murmurs of _good morrow_ and _love_ and _sweet sister_ dropped to nothing; soft smile faded as music ebbs and drifts and flows, dying its last shifting notes from the silver-stringed harp it rose from. Just as winter’s white winds blow in soft and slow, the heat of the fire-lit tent eddied out: air turned frosty as the ice-blue roses perched upon the head of a daughter of the north – a daughter who would never see the north again.

Brandon Stark was _five_ the morrow after the tourney: wolf, wild, warrior, wrong, and _wroth_.

“Lya…” he whispered, his breath smoke on frosty air. “Love.”

* * *


	4. Song

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> At the Tower of Joy exists a song of two: wolf and dragon, death and birth.

She missed the north: its hills, its valleys, its lakes of ice, its woods, its groves. She missed the icy bite of winter – and the wolf who raged as a warrior against its white winds. She missed him most, even as she lay abed beside a prince with hair silver as the starlight peeking through the half-crumbled tower.

A hand dappled in moonlight and shadow rose from amongst the red-rich covers of the bed. Soft as when he fluttered fingers over the silver-stringed harp, the prince with starlit hair ran a fleeting touch across the hard curve of her belly. He murmured as he stroked: soft sad words of song, of ice, of fire, of promises spun as smoke to the air.

“Lya,” he said, voice as soft a murmur as his silver-stringed songs. “A raven came from the red city.”

She wasn’t listening – she knew what dark words were borne by dark wings. She couldn’t _know_ yet; the prince with starlit hair had not yet told her… but she _knew_. A sennight past, she had looked out over the land spilt as soft sand and red mountains before the half-crumbled tower. It was a dry place, this land of always summer: dry and hot and bleached like bone. Yet even _here_ , even away from _him_ , she was three: wolf, wild, and warrior. Her silver prince had carried her away from the north – but she was its daughter: its ice was in her blood. _And him?_ He was in her blood, too – he _was_ her blood.

She had heard his soul that night she stared from the half-crumbled tower: deep and long, a howl, a heartache – wolfsong. It had swept the fire from this land of always summer – turned warm air as frosty as the ice-blue roses perched upon the head of a daughter of the north – a daughter who would never see the north again. _And him?_ He was gone from the north, too.

“Lya,” said the starlit prince, lifting his fingers from her belly. “I _couldn’t_ know what my father would do… I couldn’t know, sweet Lyanna.”

She was only half-listening – she knew he spoke truth and _only_ truth, this prince with honour silver as his hair. He was like her brother in that: the _wrong_ brother. The quiet storm-eyed brother who flew high as honour in the shadows of the Vale. The quiet storm-eyed brother who listened to her hurts and healed her heartaches: the brother more man than wolf. She lay now abed beside a prince with hair silver as the starlight peeking through the half-crumbled tower and wondered if her quiet storm-eyed brother had heard the wolfsong of his elder.

“Lya,” said the prince, looking at her with eyes of amethyst made wine-dark with soft sorrow. “I’ll see their bones back to Winterfell, father and son both.”

She turned her face away from him, laid a hand upon the hard curve of her belly. She liked to think it was Brandon’s seed growing strong and wolf-wild inside her – but she knew it wasn’t. Beneath skin and blood stretched taut and trembling, stormed a song soft and sad as the words of the silver prince who planted it within her womb: a song of ice, of fire, of promises spun as smoke to the air. Still, she loved it – this song that grew inside her even as her brother’s bruises faded from her neck.

She missed the north: its hills, its valleys, its lakes of ice, its woods, its groves. She missed the icy bite of winter – but here, _now_ , she felt it stretch her belly: this son of hers – a wolf despite the dragon who had planted him in her womb.

ფ

The prince with hair silver as starlight left her as he took her: with a wreath of frost upon the dark gloss of her hair. He rode a palfrey the same spun silver as starlight – but he was death upon it: ebony and charcoal shot with blood-red rubies. He rode past mountains the same jagged crimson; on and on, toward riverwater swirling blood-red beneath the bellow of a stag.

She couldn’t _know_ yet; it hadn’t yet happened… but she _knew_.

“Will I hear the dragon’s song as I heard the wolf’s?” she asked the land of always summer as it stretched dry and hot and bleached like bone before the half-crumbled tower. “Brandon.” Her voice was a whisper. “Love…”

The babe in her belly clawed and kicked: half-wolf, half-dragon – fighting for her to think of his father, not of her wild brother long drifted to ash-and-bone. She laid a hand upon the swollen stretch of her belly, smoothed the song to settle. But he was more wolf than dragon – despite the silver prince who had planted him in her womb. He clawed and kicked – tipped back his head and howled when he shuddered out between her thighs, red-streaked, black-haired, grey-eyed, _tiny_.

She missed the north: its hills, its valleys, its lakes of ice, its woods, its groves. She missed the icy bite of winter – but here, _now_ , she held it in her arms: this son of hers. Despite the dragon who was his father, he was three: wolf, wild, and warrior. _No_. He was four: wolf, wild, warrior, and _hers_.

“Mine,” she whispered, breathing in his scent: wildflowers and winter even here in the land of always summer. “My little wolf.” She kissed his brow, felt his skin as flame to her bones of ice. “ _You_ are my love, little wolf… winter’s son, more ice than fire… never forget that, mine own heart.”

She held him in her arms as she bled upon the bed: white-starched linen blood-red as the rubies turning riverwater a tide of crimson.

ფ

It was the wrong brother, he who found her in her bed of blood. The quiet storm-eyed brother: the _good_ brother, the gentle brother – the one they would call the quiet wolf. He was all that in the end: the quiet storm-eyed brother, bathed in the honour of the Vale, with some watered wisp of wolf-blood left in his veins that scented the rich warm tang of blood, the heavy sweetness of curling rose petals blue as frost – moved him lithe as a wolf closer to the bed, forced him to his knees beside it.

There she lay, that woman of three: wolf, wild, and warrior. Lyanna Stark: pale as soft-fallen snow, red-eyed as the mountains without. In her lap was a wreath of winter roses, ice-blue ice-cold – and in her arms… in her arms…

“Promise me, Ned,” she whispered in the voice of the dying. “See him safe from the antlers that killed the silver prince.” Her eyes were blue as the roses in her lap: the eyes of the dying. “Promise me, Ned.”

It was the wrong brother, he who stared storm-eyed at her from his knees beside her bed of blood. The _good_ brother, the gentle brother – the one they would call the quiet wolf. But he was not a wolf in this moment: he was the boy who listened to her hurts and healed her heartaches, before, now, _always_. He was kind and soft, good and true – as he always was. His fingers, feather-light, smoothed the gloss of dark hair back from her brow. He _looked_ at her and he _saw_ her: drank her in with eyes the same winter-grey as her own.

“Brandon…” she began, but her voice died in her throat.

“You will see him soon, Lya,” he murmured, soothing her with soft hand and gentle eyes as a lullaby to a child. “He waits for you as he always did – beneath the white-fingered weirwood tree in the godswood at home.” He leant forward; feather-light, his lips brushed her brow. “ _Home_ , sweet sister… soon you’ll both be home.” He took the babe from her arms, held him tender as a maid. “I’ll keep him safe, I promise.”

The wreath of winter roses in her lap was cold as frost – but no colder than her own bones and blood and skin. Could a crown of flowers change the world so? By look of the quiet storm-eyed brother cradling the babe to his chest, the world was already changed. The singers would say smiles died and storm-clouds blew in; but in truth it was not so sudden.

The change blew in soft and slow as winter’s white winds, turning starlit tower to dust and bone, setting frost over the fire that ruled this land of always summer. Murmurs of promises and prophecies dropped to nothing; whispers of song, of ice, of fire faded as music ebbs and drifts and flows, dying its last shifting notes from the silver-stringed harp it rose from. Just as winter’s white winds blow in soft and slow, the heat of this land of always summer eddied out: air turned frosty as the ice-blue roses laid upon the lap of a daughter of the north.

Yet she found strength: a last kiss, ice-blue ice-cold, upon the brow of her babe, upon the cheek of the _good_ brother who would do what she could not – _live_.

“Brandon…” breathed Lyanna Stark, voice and eyes the blue of the dying.

“Lya, I promise…”

* * *


	5. Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Even after death, there is life amongst the red-gold leaves of the godswood.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This short, final chapter has been in my drafts for months. A bit of house-keeping this evening _finally_ saw it find the light of day. Enjoy! 🐺

“Brandon,” a soft voice calls.

Quiet is shattered amongst the moonlit shadows of the godswood. Silver, grey, white: the world half a hundred shades of soft-fallen snow. True, it blankets this place where gods and men come to meet. Limns every red-gold leaf bone-white, shines the white-fingered weirwood tree ethereal against the ink-dark sky: bare branches silver-grey rivers veining this land of snow and ice, hard frost and frozen stone – _home_.

“Brandon,” comes that soft voice again. “Brother.”

A flash of fire at his temple: winter roses ice-blue ice-cold laid upon the lap of a daughter of the north, a palfrey the same spun silver as a prince’s hair, violet eyes glaring down from a throne of black iron and twisted swords: father _melting_ , scent of leather and steel and smoke and _meat_ – no breath, strangling, _bruising_ , choking, calling, reaching for blade and failing, failing, _falling_ , drifting, dying as the red-gold leaves across the deep black pool he blinks out at now.

“Brandon…” a softer voice, close to his ear. “Love.”

He sees her reflection in the deep black pool: a ghost, a wraith, a shadow, a spirit run from the thatch of ironwood, oak, elm, and alder. Her gown – soft grey wool, billowing in a breezeless forest, drifting around her slim waist. He frowns. There, at her belly – _blood_ , dark blood, old as magic, old as time, endless, eternal: _life_ blood. Above, breasts unmoving – no breath, but he _feels_ her alive as him.

“Lya…” he begins, but his voice dies in his throat.

She steps from the mirrored black pool now, kneels beside him amongst the crooked roots of the heart tree: dove-grey gown dripping, hair damp, eyes liquid as the ripples bearing red-gold leaves across the glossy black surface. Takes his hand, puts it to her cheek. Ice-cold ice-blue as the winter roses still sitting on the dark gloss of her hair. He pulls the crown of frost from her head, throws it onto the pool: softly, they land, softly, they sink.

“You are not his, little sister,” he says, tracing the cold curve of her cheek, whispering the swell of her mouth. “You are _mine_.”

Are they wolves still?

_Always_ – as one they are three: wolf, wild, and warrior.

But they are wraiths now, too – and yet they are _warm_.

“Even a dragon could not turn my skin to flame,” she says softly. “Only you can do that, brother… the wolf who moves wild as me.” She leans toward him, breathing even as no breath turns to smoke on the icy air. “Ned was right – you waited for me.”

“Ned…” he whispers, the name a mist of memory, a drop of water on his tongue: ash and ache, drifting as red-gold leaves to the shadow of the soil. “Our quiet storm-eyed brother… a better lord than me, better husband, better _man_.”

“He will live,” she murmurs. “With my little wolf… they will both _live_.”

They come together now, as wolves, as wraiths – as _warmth_ in this land of snow and ice, hard frost and frozen stone. Home: they are _home_.

Soft lips part beneath his kiss landing gentle as the drifting red-gold leaves. Her fingers, feathers of frost, whisper over the hard column of his neck, find the blue-black bruise that rings it; his hands sweep the dark blood at her belly. Death has left its mark on each of them: _dark_ marks, old as magic, old as time, endless, eternal, _life_ blood that bonds them here in the shadows of the godswood.

They make their bed amongst red-gold leaves that smell of frost and fire, she parts her legs beneath his weight, he presses inside her and they are whole again, they are _home_. Her fingers clutch at his back. He tastes her kiss: hills, valleys, lakes of ice, woods, groves, winter, wild – the north, their home… forever.

“Cry, little sister,” he whispers. “You are safe now… you are _home_.”

“Yours,” she murmurs, ice-drop tear running down her cheek; she shivers as he sucks the salt of it off her velvet skin. “As you are mine.”

* * *


End file.
